I’d offer to clarify your goals for yourself and the group as a whole are as a first motion. What I mean is if the purpose of your group is to form connection it would probably look different than if it was to organize people. Do you think you’d like to try and get folks less knowledgeable about the cause or is this more for dedicated comrades who want to do more than 101 type introduction?

Technically, I started a leftist/communist book club like 2.5/ 3 years ago. it still exists, but has gone through several iterations and that had led me to varying levels of engagement throughout. Ours started cause I found out someone I loosely knew was a comrade, and I’m in a comrade deprived area- neither of us had read ‘state and revolution’, so we wanted to fix that- we’d meet weekly and go 25-40 pgs at a time, and met at a local bar and talk about the book, current events, life in general.

Sometimes it has been a small group of well read comrades with a clear ability to express what they are interested in and able to organize toward it spontaneously. Other times, me and some others have felt like nannies managing a conversation between libs or at least folks that have never heard the term ‘eco fascism’ for ex. Figuring out what you want it to be seems important because it will impact how you feel about it- is it a chore and a service that you are providing for the community or is it an escape and safe haven for comrades who are already active in the world?

I think the authentic connections are the starting point, at least have been for us. We spend 20+ min starting out by just talking about our weeks, normal humans supporting each other stuff and/or current events; then we bring up the book, talk about what we all got out of the chapters, and riff off each other’s ideas (we do not use structured guiding questions about the chapters or anything- but it is a word of mouth org. so a certain level of structure isnt needed); then we usually blend thoughts on the book and current events, before wrapping up generally 90-120 minutes after we started.

Hope something in there helps, I hope you keep us posted and have fun!

I’ve been running the Capital reading threads over on Hexbear.net this year. In my experience, you need a good schedule, a work that is engaging and not too long, and you need to participate as well to keep the conversation going each week. Keep a list of people to notify when the new thread drops as well.

Radicalizing people is a different thing entirely. People are generally radicalized by their conditions, you don’t just push a “radicalize” button. You need to identify the radicalized people and help guide them to Marxism-Leninism, not wasting time on the fash or other reactionaries. Personally, I do my agitprop online on Lemmy.ml, which is more broadly federated. I stick to Lemmy.ml so I don’t get dogpiled on or censored, and try to use my own words as much as I can so I don’t merely quote-bomb, which seems more like evangelizing than an actual conversation. I also share my introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list if I think it will be useful.

Back to theory, I’d say focus on a subject. Philosophy, economics, imperialism, AES history, and party work are all excellent topic, as an example, as well as queer theory, etc. Start small and easy, then expand as it becomes more in-depth, if the threads die then start a new topic or try to go to a simpler piece.

Best of luck!